Interview with Editor of New Fairy Tales Magazine, Claire Massey

Today I'm pleased to present an interview with Claire Massey, Editor of the wonderful UK based New Fairy Tales magazine (available online). I mentioned her wonderful blog in an earlier post today HERE and discussed the magazine a while back HERE.

Let's get right to the questions - Claire has lots of interesting things to say about new fairy tales versus old!

FAIRY TALE NEWS HOUND: Hi Claire! Thank you for agreeing to answer a few questions for Once Upon A Blog. Your magazine focuses on new and original fairy tales as opposed to retellings. Can you explain how 'new fairy tales' are different from writing a piece of fantasy?

CLAIRE: For me, part of it is the form, like the traditional tales a new fairy tale is usually written in short story format (although of course there are fairy tale novels and I think it's in those in particular that the lines can become quite blurred between fairy tale and fantasy) and like a traditional tale events usually follow a certain pattern - for example things happening in threes. A new fairy tale will also draw upon the wealth of motifs that we have inherited from both the oral and literary traditions; new fairy tales can’t exist in isolation, they are created in conversation with the tales that have come before.

When writing fantasy you are free to create any kind of world you’d like for your story but following the traditions of the form new fairy tales usually take place in our world (even if it is a ‘once upon a time’ version of it), or in faerie, or at a meeting point between the two. Also, in fantasy that's based in our world characters may express surprise at the fantastical events they become embroiled in but in a fairy tale nobody ever questions the fantastical, anything can happen and nobody bats an eyelid.

FTNH: You obviously love fairy tales of all kinds. What was the inspiration for the magazine/how did its initial creation come about? Why did you decide to focus on original/new fairy tale only?

CLAIRE: I'd been re-reading Andersen's tales and I was inspired to have a go at writing fairy tales. At the time I didn’t really think about the divide between original tales and retellings, as I got more drawn in to the genre I re-read the Grimms, Oscar Wilde and George MacDonald - again not differentiating, I just loved the stories. It was only as I started to do more research and reading that I began to appreciate that there are two distinct types of literary tale. Although I love both I was particularly intrigued by the new tales and a lot of the online and print magazines that existed seemed to focus mainly on retellings so I decided to create an online space for new tales. The name New Fairy Tales seemed like a good choice and I later discovered that this is the same name Andersen used for several of his collections, Nye Eventyr in the Danish.

The Owl Encounter
by Karen Wendy Hurd
(Her work will be featured in the next issue of New Fairy Tales)

FTNH: How is writing a 'new' fairy tale different from writing a retelling? (apart from the lack of story template)

CLAIRE: Apart from the lack of story template I think there's actually a lot of common ground between the two. Whether you're writing a new fairy tale or a retelling you have to start from a love of the old stories, you have to be immersed in the form and motifs and you have to have the desire to create something new; for a retelling this will be a new version- your version of a tale, for a new fairy tale it will come from a different starting point but it will still be influenced by all the other tales you've read.

I suppose one of the main differences I've seen, in terms of what's submitted to the magazine and the retellings I read elsewhere, is that a lot of writers base new fairy tales in the realm of 'once upon a time', whereas writers of retellings often seem to feel freer to use contemporary, or strikingly different settings; they know a reader will recognise the characters and the plot, which they can then follow or subvert, and the story will still be read as a fairy tale. I think new fairy tale writers feel they have to try harder to make something feel like a fairy tale for it to be classed as such and so I get sent a lot of tales which carefully emulate the old tales. I do enjoy these but I would also like to see more new fairy tales in contemporary settings and/or addressing current issues; in the way Andersen used the form to address aspects of 19^th Century society; and Kurt Schwitters, the Weimar and Nazi periods in Germany.

FTNH: Hans Christian Andersen is often considered the father of the literary (or original) fairy tale. Who are some of your favorite original FT writers (historical and/or contemporary)?

The Butterfly Woods
by Karen Wendy Hurd
(Her work will be featured in the next issue of New Fairy Tales)

CLAIRE: Along with Andersen, Wilde and MacDonald I love to read A.S. Byatt – her ‘The Story of the Eldest Princess’ from The Djinn in the Nightingale’s Eye is one of my all time favourites. I’m also a big fan of the work of our (the UK’s) current poet laureate Carol Ann Duffy. Her fairy tale books are marketed as being for children but true to the form they contain some deliciously dark elements and should be equally savoured by adults. I’ve also recently read and enjoyed Jane Yolen’s Tales of Wonder and I’ve got a long list of other books by her I want to read!

FTNH: Regarding 'old' fairy tales (not just the European classic canon but ones from all over the world throughout the ages) - which ones are your favorites and why?

CLAIRE: It’s always so hard to choose, but two of my favourites were collected in England; the first is ‘Mossycoat’, a gypsy tale that contains similarities to ‘Cinderella’ and ‘Catskin’. It was collected in 1915 from a town in Lancashire called Oswaldtwistle, which is near where I grew up. The tale’s written in dialect and it’s got a brilliant energy to it. A girl’s mother spins her a wishing coat from moss and golden thread and she uses it to get to a big house where she goes to work as a servant and keeps getting whacked on the head with a skimmer. I quite like the fact that Mossycoat isn’t a perfect heroine; on her mother’s advice she takes advantage of a hawker’s affections in order to get fine clothes and shoes. The text isn’t available online but it is contained in The Virago Book of Fairy Tales, edited by Angela Carter (Ed. FTNH: This book is titled the 'The Old Wives' Fairy Tale Book' in the US).

I also love ‘The Buried Moon’, which can be found in Joseph Jacobs’ More English Fairy Tales, it’s slightly mythic and it’s packed with beautiful and eerie images - like the moon being buried in the dirt by bogles and other creeping evil things - it’s a great atmospheric read.

In terms of my reading to this point I do feel I have been guilty of concentrating on European tales - I think part of it is feeling overwhelmed - there are so many tales out there to read, where do you start? For me the answer has been to start with the tales that I grew up with and then to work my way outwards, it might be impossible to read them all but I'm hoping to make a good sized dent!

Thank you so much for chatting with the Fairy Tale News Hound today. We 're looking forward to the next issue!

Writing an original fairy tale is a fun challenge. If you're interested in submitting to New Fairy Tales, please check the submission guidelines HERE. Submissions to New Fairy Tales are open to everyone, though you should be aware the standard is high and inclusion is not guaranteed. The deadline for the Winter issue is looming : OCTOBER 20TH!

Please note: New Fairy Tales is a supporter of Derian House Children's Hospice a center for the care and support of children with life threatening diseases and terminal illnesses and encourage you to show your support for the magazine by sending donations to them. You can read more about the hospice HERE.

J. K. Rowling Announced As Recipient of New H.C. Andersen Literature Prize

Portrait of J.K. Rowling
by Meghan Ballback
(using Rowling's own words)

From The Copenhagen Post online:

The literature prize is to be awarded to someone who can directly or indirectly be compared with Hans Christian Andersen.

Rowling will travel to Odense in October 2010 to attend the award ceremony in person. The city is very excited about her coming visit for a special reason:

The city already has a strong link to Rowling’s books and hosts an annual Harry Potter Festival, which transforms the City Hall into Hogwarts School for witches and wizards. The festival is run in conjunction with the public library to encourage children to read.

(The rest of the article can be read HERE.)

This isn't the only HCA award, for instance, there is the Hans Christian Andersen Medal that's often called the "Little Nobel Prize" and is awarded to a writer and an illustrator bi-annually. You can find details on the 2010 nominees for that HERE.

As far as I can tell, the award Rowling will receive is the first of its kind but there's no doubt its a great honor.

First 5 1/2 Minutes of Disney's The Princess and the Frog Now Available To View

I've debated on whether or not to post this (there have been SO many PatF posts recently!) but figure some might be keen to see it.

It's the first five minutes (the opening, without the titles) from Disney's The Princess and the Frog. It isn't all completed animation, which is kind of nice to see actually, but it is continuous, except for the last 30 seconds or so. I think this is now available because it's on the Snow White Blu-ray disc as an 'exclusive preview' which was released on Tuesday.This clip is, unfortunately, heavy on the little-girl-princess aspect and doesn't show how the movie is likely to appeal to more than little girls but it does have an amusing scene with a frog with Tiana as a little girl.


Here's the last 30 seconds or so which seems to be missing from half the review sites - it's the part I like best. Enjoy!

Introducing The Fairy Tale Cupboard

I'd like to draw your attention to a fairly new blog I've linked to called "The Fairy Tale Cupboard". It's run by Claire Massey, the Editor of New Fairy Tales magazine, and is a wonderful treat to read.

(The Fairy Tale News Hound interviewed Claire recently. Watch for it - the post should be up some time today. Very interesting discussion on new fairy tales versus old!)

My favorite feature would have to be the Profiles of Famous Fairy Tale Figures. If you like Sarah Beth Durst's obscure fairy tale commentaries, you'll love these profiles. They're entertaining and educational and a wonderful summary and resource for study.

So far Red (of Riding Hood fame) and Jack (the Beanstalk Jack) have been profiled and we've had information on their names, ages, relationship status, story variations, online appearances and more.Who Has Come To Sing Us Carols?
by Cate Simmons (a.k.a. Steeringfornorth on Flckr)
This is just one of the amazing fairy tale artists Claire Massey has 'discovered' for us.

Here's an excerpt from Jack's rap sheet:

Age: Not as sprightly as he looks; there's no dating the oral story but the first recorded mention of him is in a burlesque version of the tale in an early eighteenth century chapbook...

And from Red's:

Relationship status: Two unlikely love interests, the first is the wolf, as seen in "Little Red-Cap"...

And there are little surprises too, like the recipe for a cake especially for Red's Granny (it has rum in it).

Gathering Together in Silence...
by Cate Simmons (a.k.a. Steeringfornorth on Flckr)

Other regular features include:

Fairy Tales and... : a series of subjects and their relation to fairy tales. Posted so far: Fairy Tales and Shadows, Fairy Tales and Beds. I love this feature too. Fabulous articles!
FoFTs (friends of fairy tales): info about wonderful people who work tirelessly to share and promote fairy tales. These are people we should all be aware of, being fairy tale enthusiasts.
Events/Exhibitions: info and reviews (Especially good for UK readers! Watch for ones in your area.)
Fairy Tale Treats: art, books and other lovely fairy tale related things. Claire has a real knack for finding gorgeous art/illustrations and objects. This is evident in the magazine too.

You can find The Fairy Tale Cupboard HERE.

So there's plenty of fairy tale related work coming from this talented woman, even between issues of New Fairy Tales online magazine.

Speaking of NFT, Claire is hard at working collecting and editing stories and commissioning gorgeous artwork for the next issue. If you'd like to contribute either writing or art, please contact Claire at editor AT newfairytales.co.uk and make sure to read the submissions information HERE too.

Star

by Faye Durston
Her work is featured in the first issue of New Fairy Tales.

"Fairy Tales and Strange Birds" - New Painting Series by Brenda York

"Rapunzel Lays Bare Her Wanton Waves"

by Brenda York

San Diego artist Brenda York is about to show her new series of paintings titled "Fairy Tales and Strange Birds". She describes her style as 'whimsical/figurative abstract' and will be showing her versions of Jack and the Beanstalk, Little Miss Muffet, Four & Twenty Blackbirds, Snow White (and her Little People') and Rapunzel.

Usually contemporary art renditions of fairy tales tend to the uber-dark or disturbing side as opposed to children's illustrations which tend to the other extreme of simple and graphic (ie. strong design) to detailed and traditionally illustrative. It's refreshing to see someone working with fairy tales in this vein for a change.

The image above is the first preview from the series on her blog and she's posted the series on her website since.

Here's what she says about her new works:

As promised, this week and next I will be posting my new series, "Fairy Tales And Strange Birds"...The opening reception will be on this coming Friday, Oct 9 at Bread & Cie in Hillcrest from 5:30 to 7pm. Please drop by for some wine tasting, treats and twisted fairy tales. There will be five new large paintings and eight individual portraits of Snow White's gang (And yes, I said eight!) ...Hopefully in the next couple of days I will have the whole series up on my website for up close viewing.

Jack And The Magic Bean Faux Pas
by Brenda York

You can see more of her work on her blog HERE and on her website HERE. Her fairy tale series can be viewed all together HERE.

Release Day: "Ice" (A Retelling of 'East Of the Sun, West Of the Moon') by Sarah Beth Durst

It's release day for "Ice" by Sarah Beth Durst (Happy release day Sarah!) and I can sincerely say I've been looking forward to this ever since I heard about it.

"Ice" is a retelling of the "East O' the Sun, West O' the Moon" fairy tale from Norway and if you're not familiar with it, many of the elements still will be, as some parts are very similar to Beauty and the Beast. (You can click on the tale title to be taken to SurLaLune for the text, annotations, illustrations and more.) Sarah's book, though, is set in the modern Arctic and promises to be a really unique and wonderful retelling that will stand out among the many other novels and novelettes out there. The two chapters available to read HERE only whet my appetite more.Here's a brief blurb from Amazon:

When Cassie was a little girl, her grandmother told her a fairy tale about her mother, who made a deal with the Polar Bear King and was swept away to the ends of the earth. Now that Cassie is older, she knows the story was a nice way of saying her mother had died. Cassie lives with her father at an Arctic research station, is determined to become a scientist, and has no time for make-believe.

Then, on her eighteenth birthday, Cassie comes face-to-face with a polar bear who speaks to her. He tells her that her mother is alive, imprisoned at the ends of the earth. And he can bring her back -- if Cassie will agree to be his bride.

That is the beginning of Cassie's own real-life fairy tale, one that sends her on an unbelievable journey across the brutal Arctic, through the Canadian boreal forest, and on the back of the North Wind to the land east of the sun and west of the moon. Before it is over, the world she knows will be swept away, and everything she holds dear will be taken from her -- until she discovers the true meaning of love and family in the magical realm of Ice.

As is fitting for a great romance, Sarah has called this book "a love letter to my husband. Beyond the ice and the bears and the everything, ICE is about true love, the kind of love where you face the world as a team... the kind where you'd go east of the sun and west of the moon for each other." (from today's post and her reflections about how the creating the book began and why this project is personal and special.)Sarah's fun and lively personality is evident in her books, her BLOG, when she's interviewed and in the fabulous commentary of what she calls "Obscure Fairy Tales". They're one of my favorite things I've ever read in a blog, anywhere. For these she posts the traditional text of a fairy tale she's come across in her wide ranging research and, almost line by line, writes her reaction and thoughts to the events happening in the story. (Genius! I wish I'd thought to do something like this but I doubt my commentary would be half so entertaining!) While waiting for the book release date to arrive Sarah kindly put up another obscure fairy tale on her blog to keep us entertained last week. Here's a short excerpt so you can see what I mean:

The Giant Who Had No Heart in His Body (from Asbjornsen and Moe)

Catchy title. I would have gone with "The Heartless Giant." Reminds me of the original title for "War and Peace": "War and the Time That Was Less Full of Death and Destruction."

Once upon a time... six princes leave home to find brides, but they forget to bring home a bride for the seventh brother.

"My brothers went a-wooing and all I got was this lousy T-shirt."

On their way home, the brothers and their brides encounter a giant who turns them all to stone.

Bummer. So much for that road trip.

And so it goes on. If you love fairy tales and you've never heard of Sarah before, it should be clear by now you need to be reading her books and blog!

Her two previous books - "Into the Wild" and "Out of the Wild", both based on fairy tales with Rapunzel's daughter as the protagonist - are shown below:Regarding the "East O' the Sun, West O' the Moon" fairy tale, the subject of a girl traveling the snowy wilds on the back of a polar bear is a favorite among fairy tale illustrators (Sarah says P.J. Lynch's artwork had a helping hand in inspiring her to write the novel) but instead of showing you more illustrations I thought I'd just stick with Cliff Nielsen's gorgeous cover for today (Don't you think the girl looks very much like her?) and instead found this lovely snow sculpture you're seeing throughout this post, photographed in Wyoming.
NOTE: Unfortunately I can't find any information on the snow sculptor, just that it was created for the International Snow Sculpting Championships in 2005. If anyone has more information, please let me know. I'd love to give credit to the talented sculptor.

Snow White Told In Dominoes

Snow White by ManelleOliphant
(You can see more of her work by clicking on the image above.
Her illustration for Once Upon A Mattress was featured in this post HERE)

Since we're on a Snow White kick today I thought I'd drag this little gem out of my archives to show you: the story of Snow White (a la Disney) told in dominoes.

This must have taken hours to plan and do. There's a little intro you have to sit through before the dominoes start falling but it's completely worth the wait.


I must admit, I was waiting for a piece of apple to pop out at the end there, or for an ill-timed sneeze! Amazing stuff.

Disney's Snow White Out On Blu-ray Today + Exhibition Coming To New Orleans

A while ago I posted the announcement that Disney's "Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs" was being released on Blu-ray and discussed some of the new features, including the new artwork created specifically for this release. (You can find that post HERE.)

Today's the day you can finally go buy it (please note the above image is actually the DVD cover which will be released seven weeks from today). Rather than link you to Amazon again I'm going to send you to the SurLaLune blog HERE, where yesterday Heidi gave details of a discount coupon available for a very limited period of time. She also linked to the various packages available for you (thanks Heidi!).In honor of this landmark film being released in the best quality available to us today, rather than talk about the Blu-ray product again I want to point you toward a couple of other related things.

The first is a very interesting article HERE in which Lella Smith, the Creative Director of Disney's Animation Research Library was interviewed about the restoration of the film and the sort of information the ARL staff are 'privy to' and 'keepers of'. I haven't seen more than small quotes from ARL librarians before so this extended article (it is longer than an average article) is a treat and uncovers more of Disney's consideration of the Grimm's tale than you usually hear of.
For example, here's an excerpt from the interview which describes Walt Disney (the man)'s awareness of the 'original' versions of the tale and his reasons for changing the things he did (please note - the article seems to essentially be an unedited transcript of a conversation, complete with all the odd speech fillers):

Can you talk about a few of the differences from the Brothers Grimm? We talked a bit about it from the Brothers Grimm telling to the Disney telling.

Lella Smith: Sure, one of my favorite subjects. Well, you know, Snow White was a story that had been around for decades and decades in an oral tradition. And in many different countries there were subtle changes and not so subtle changes. In one of the stories I remember I think it was in an Italian version the huntsman was supposed to cut off Snow White's toe and use it as a stopper in a bottle of her blood. You know, there were lots of changes in the story. And Snow White who was seven years old and the daughter of the queen, that was pretty frightening to think about. So when Walt began to decide about his Snow White although she is young, I've seen his story note that says look, she has to be old enough to be able to consider marriage. So, you know, and they thought out those differences. The huntsman depending on which fairy tale you read sometimes he had to bring back the liver, sometimes the heart. So that changed with different tellings. And in some tellings the queen was to dance in the hot - shoes that had been put in the hot coals until she dropped dead. So, you know, Walt Disney said wait a minute, let's get rid of the queen earlier so that we can celebrate the happiness of the story. So in fact he had the witch fall off the cliff so that the prince and Snow White could then celebrate their happiness together in the forest. So there were lots of subtle changes but they were all done with a purpose. Another change was that in the original version you remember that the queen came three times to try to kill Snow White and each time - the first two times the dwarfs arrived home in plenty of time to save her but the third time they didn't. And so, you know, Walt said well one poison apple is enough, let's get it over with so that change was made. But there were - they were changes that were not made without a lot of thought because to him, he was taking well known stories and transferring them to a different kind of medium, the screen. And so he had to in some ways expand the story to full length film. In some ways he had to simplify the story so that it wouldn't be overcomplicated on screen. And when you think about it, these were changes that were no different from changes made in one telling to the next telling. Often when tellers told these fairy tales they would make little changes depending on how, you know, they felt the story should go. So it was continuation of the idea that fairy tales are oral tradition and until, you know, they were written down by the Grimms Brothers, you know, they were just pretty much all over the place.

Lella Smith also discusses, in some detail, how the various dwarf characters were developed from name through to how they each moved and behaved differently in the same situation.The other thing I'd like to draw your attention to is, in the article Ms. Smith announced an exhibition that will show in New Orleans on Disney and fairy tales in November. She also mentioned some upcoming books the ARL are involved with (the bold is mine):

Lella Smith: ...we're opening an exhibition on November 15 in New Orleans called Dreams Come True, Art of the Classic Fairy Tales from the Walt Disney Studio. And that is an exhibition that celebrates fairy tales, talks about how Walt Disney Studio changed them, some of the reasons they did, the elements of animation are represented in the exhibition and there will be about 800 works. So I wrote the catalog and the text labels and then we'll go there for the opening. And then we're working on books. We're just coming out with a book now the second in the animation archive series on animation. And we've just finished designing the design book which this is the third in the series of books. It's called the archive series that goes back and picks out the finest of the finest of the stories from our library, the finest animation, the finest design pieces, and puts them into a big book available on Amazon.com.

It sounds like a fascinating exhibition. I only wish I could get to New Orleans to see it.

Giants Cast Their Steampunk Fairy Tale Magic in Berlin

Ready for a larger-than-life steampunk fairy tale?

Today the giants (and their handlers) that have walked the streets (and rivers) of Berlin for 4 days are taking a well deserved rest after a happy reunion that mirrors the story of the city itself.

It's been almost 20 years since the Berlin Wall fell and this year, as part of the 19th annual unification celebration, the giant marionettes of French contemporary street arts/theater company Royal de Luxe staged a special performance, the story of which took place over 4 days.

The presentation was called "The Giants Arrive - A Fairy Tale for Berlin" and will no doubt remain in the memory of everyone fortunate enough to see them (estimated to be around 1 million lucky people) for the rest of their lives. The larger giant marionette, stands around 31 feet tall and weighs in at 2.5 tons - seeing it in person is not something you're likely to forget!First seen in 1993, the company has continued adding 'chapters' to their giant story over the years, including such wonders as a giant Sultan's Elephant (very steampunk in style and pictured below) that sprayed water over the watching crowds. The technical feats required for building, moving, manipulating and most of all, telling an emotional story with these puppets is awe inspiring. These are the largest fully-functional, traveling puppets in the world.Here's a wonderful video from an older show which captures a little of how incredible these street performances are:


From Spiegel Online International reporting the day before Royal de Luxe began their show in Berlin:

The company is bringing two puppets to Berlin. One is 9.5 meters (31 feet) tall and weighs 2.5 tons. It is a deep-sea diver and will be wearing an atmospheric diving suit made out of truck tarpaulins as it makes its way through the city and its waterways, aided by 31 helpers decked out in red livery. The helpers are called the "Lilliputians," after the little people in Swift's book. The smaller puppet -- at 5.5 meters (18 feet) and 800 kilograms (1,750 pounds) -- won't just be walking around; it will also be driving a scooter and a boat with the help of 22 Lilliputians.

Regarding the fairy tale of the title, here's what the creative head of Royal de Luxe, Jean-Luc Courcoult, said about the actual story (again from Spiegel Online International):

"It's a family story; it won't be political," Courcoult said... He went on to explain, his company will be telling a fairy tale about a long separation with the following plot: Terrible events have torn a city in two and caused one part of the city to be walled in. The big puppet is stuck in the west of the city, and the smaller one in the east. The big puppet drags a dormant geyser along the riverbed and places it under a wall. Then it wakes up the geyser to let it break down the city's barrier and allow the puppets to reunite.

You can read the rest of the article, which also details some of the amazing technical specifications as well as a lovely photo gallery of the event, HERE.

I found more details on the backstory of the tale HERE (reported by R.J. Evans for Socyberty - a website that publishes articles exploring social issues and how society changes/has changed - in June this year). I've put together the essential points in a collection of quotes below but there's a lot more information and detail in the article - I recommend clicking over to read it. The story is basically about a giant deep-sea diver who has been searching the world-over for his missing giantesse niece:

In 1912 the Titanic went down to the bottom of the ocean. Unknown to us, however, was that in its hold a giantess was held captive, the mother of the Little Giantess.

The enormous diver is the scouring the earth for the Little Giantesse. She was captured in Iceland which was at the time the home of the giants, each having his or her own particular task. The Little Giantess was to wake up the geysers of Iceland when a message needed to be sent. You may wonder what on earth geysers and messages have in common but little known to the outside world the geysers were used to transmit signals between the giants, much like the smoke signals of American natives.

But where does the deep-sea diver properly come in to the story? He is the brother of the giantess who drowned on the Titanic. Originally he had been busy doing his own job – sawing up icebergs – to realize that his sister and her daughter were missing.

In his past he has travelled the seabed for years and eventually he found the wreck of the Titanic. He buried his sister near the sunken ship. While there he discovered a mysterious box full of mail from the Titanic. He now had two new goals in life – the task of finding his niece and to deliver the mail. Since then he has wandered the earth in search of the Little Giantess.

And, as you may infer from the photos, all obstacles are conquered and the happy reunion occurred, fittingly, in Berlin near where the Wall once stood.Royal de Luxe apparently has no website and does no ordinary PR (the city of London put together a beautiful web presentation - including an extensive gallery - for the famed 2006 appearance which included the Sultan's Elephant. You can see that HERE ) but this website HERE has a long, fantastically detailed, yet easy-to-navigate article on the company.

The fact that Royal de Luxe make these extraordinary characters out of discarded items and what is essentially junk, is part of the magic - transforming the ordinary into the extraordinary. Fairy tales do the same thing by putting just a little magic into a tale, creating Märchen or 'Wonder Tales'. It is very fitting that these puppets have become part of the world and story of fairy tales. I sincerely hope I one day have the opportunity to experience one of the 'chapters' of these giant stories in person.

Goldilocks Bares Her Wild Side

I came across this painting called "Goldilocks Rages Against the Fall" and thought it was an interesting and different way to use the Goldilocks themes and images.

The artist, Van Arno, has an new exhibition called "A Change of Skin" that opened on Saturday at the Corey Helford Gallery in Culver City, CA (Los Angeles). This exhibition draws from legends and mythology to explore ideas of transformation and evolution.

From BoingBoing:

...The process of transformation and evolution is no easy task, and Arno skillfully narrates a dynamic collection of Darwinian daydreams in his latest series of oil paintings. Werewolves, centaurs and women shed their original skin, emerging as new breeds of enchanted beings and barbaric beasts.

You can read more about the exhibition and see more of the pieces HERE, and at the gallery HERE. (Goldilocks is the only piece I found drawn from fairy tales but those interested in mythology may find other pieces interesting.)

Please note: many of the pictures are NOT SAFE FOR WORK due to 'suggestive' nudity (ie. not classical nudity) and some representations of violence.

You can can see Van Arno's website HERE. His work will be on display until October 24th, 2009.